The High Court case, in Pretoria on March 27, saw the full gamut of human emotions: anger; frustration and folly, followed by joy.
The latter emotion came from the long-suffering 27 independent power producers who won the case against an interdict to pave the way for the signing of the Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) with the Department of Energy – the 20-year agreements that give them a chance to claw back $3.8 billion in investment.
The deal will add 2,300MW of green power to the estimated 40,000MW in installed capacity. Despite this, green power will make up 5% of South Africa’s power.
Outside the court, the thwarted National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) members and pressure group Transform SA weighed in with the anger and frustration coupled with a threat to block the streets in protest. As the union licked its wounds, the court poured on salt by ordering it to pay costs as it stuck the application from the roll.
“We got it from Eskom that if they introduce these renewables, they’ve done calculations on power station by power station on how many jobs will be lost. When we did this study last year it was found that 30,000 to 40,000 jobs are likely to be lost and there seems to be no interest about that,” says Numsa Secretary Irvin Jim.
“We are prepared to block the streets to achieve this.”
This claim despite the fact that Eskom will have to close down a number of its ageing and crumbling coal-fired power stations.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/10/30/road-green-future/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: On The Road To A Green Future</a>
“The South African population is being taken for a ride. Our fiscus is being looted because these companies, IPPs are only producing 5% power and taking 30% of Eskom’s profits,” says Transform SA’s Adil Chabeleng outside the court.
The mighty National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) – the biggest union in Africa with more than 300,000 members – agrees with Numsa that the unions don’t want private money generating the people’s electricity. They also feel that capitalists have benefited from public money ploughed into kick-starting green energy with preferential tariffs.
“We view this capitalist IPPs deal as a backdoor privatization of Eskom. The plan is to privatize 42% of Eskom by 2030 masquerading as the implementation of clean energy,” the NUM said in an angry statement.
“We are going to mobilize all our members and society to revolt against this planned madness called IPPs.”
Days after this fire and fury, Energy Minister Jeff Radebe shocked many by putting pen-to-paper for the PPAs to end the years of waiting.
The big problem now is to revive the dormant green power industry in South Africa.
“We have to resuscitate the industry to generate this power. Supply chains have to be rebuilt and manufacturing restarted. The whole supply chain has lain dormant for nearly three years,” says Brenda Martin, a board member of the South African Renewable Energy Council that represents most of the 27 IPPS.
Martin also refutes one of the claims of the unions that green power will see billions leaving South Africa and into the pockets of foreign investors. Numsa&#8217;s legal counsel Advocate Nazeer Cassim had argued in court that the signing of the IPPs could be viewed as a form of economic looting.
“Only 25% of this deal is owned by foreign investors and the rules of the game is that most of the money must stay in the country.”
Whatever the fall-out over the signing of the PPAs, just weeks before, this unsteady progress was a pipe dream after many months of dithering and a court case.
Picture this: multi-millionaire, suited and booted, investors leave air-conditioned airport lounges to fly thousands of miles to Africa to accept a government invitation to finally sign up for a return on their investment; only to arrive to, amid confusion, a court case, disappointment and a union that they’d never heard of, threatening to block the streets in protest against the deal. Confused? Most of them were.
“Excuse me,” a fresh-off-the-plane Italian investor, who looked like a clown lost in a circus, at the Department of Energy, asked one of the many young journalists at the press briefing, in Pretoria, on March 13.
“What is happening?”
The confused man from Milan was one of a number of foreign investors, from Spain to the United States, who flew in to sign PPA contracts. Investors expect it will take them a decade to claw back their money.
There was chaos before the investors landed that morning. Overnight, the militant Numsa – a union that appears to have forgotten that the Berlin wall came down – claimed it had won a late-night court interdict against the signing.
When it came to the signing later that day, in Pretoria, Energy Minister Radebe told investors that the courts had in fact not issued an interdict, as Numsa had claimed; it rather postponed the next hearing until March 27. You can understand the confusion of the man from Milan.
“It’s a banana republic,” chirped one of the South African investors in the wake of a day to forget in the course of renewable energy.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2014/02/01/shedding-light-renewable-energy/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Shedding Light On Renewable Energy</a>
More inexplicable for investors was how these IPP contracts raised the ire of the unions almost overnight; there was hardly a peep from them in the years of government foot-dragging over signing them that has left many of the green power producers; at least 14 of the 27, according to industry, sources – on the brink of bankruptcy.
The coal-fired power stations of South Africa, built in the 1970s, are ramshackle and inefficient. Last year, the government said it was going to shut down the 3,000MW Kriel, 1,000MW Komati, 2,000MW Hendrina and the 1,600MW Camden power stations, all in Mpumalanga, anyway.
In any case, renewable energy generates a mere 5% of South Africa’s total power so the chances of green energy elbowing out coal, which produces nearly 80%, are unlikely in the extreme. It is more likely that South Africa’s coal-fired power stations will perish under the weight of repair bills and the cost of compliance with environmental regulations on account of the vast amount of acrid black smoke they belch into the African sky every year.
Other energy experts put down the government lethargy over signing the PPAs to ill-advised complacency. Low growth leading to low demand for electricity, plus a 500% increase in cost since 2007, has seen a cessation of power cuts in South Africa, for the time being.
Under the current energy scenario, South Africa will have more than 60GW of capacity by 2022, against a flagging demand of below 30GW, Ted Blom, a partner at Mining &amp; Energy Advisory, said. 
All in all, South Africa, which once dreamed of building the continent’s leading green power industry, creating thousands of jobs, has done quite a lot to destroy that dream. As well as the near three-year delay over signing the IPP contracts – the government has been penny-pinching, that is, trying to negotiate down tariffs with the argument that the country doesn’t really need energy right now.
What it means is that South African renewable energy producers are now looking across the continent for projects in favour of trusting the backed-up process in their own country. One of the unintended consequences of this whole controversy is likely to be that a score of African nations – who once lagged behind in renewable energy – could find themselves at the cutting edge of the industry thanks to South African technology and knowhow fostered by South African tax money and exported thanks to foot-dragging over contracts in Pretoria. Now, for hard-pressed South African taxpayers, that is an issue worth blocking the streets over.

Solar panels and windmills

Save Jobs Or Save Energy? The Dilemma Of Going Green

Africa’s biggest platinum industry faces one of the most bruising years in its history. Unions and management have drawn battle lines for pay talks and a cloud of question marks hangs over the mining laws – dual uncertainty that could deter foreign investors from putting money in a country that produces 70% of the world’s platinum.
In July, pay talks for a new one-year deal began. Unions for 130,000 workers in South African platinum mines, sat down with the big three: AngloPlats, Implats and Lonmin. They are likely to prove tricky and drag on for weeks. The majority union, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu), wants a 15% pay rise; the second largest, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), wants 20% across the board. Both unions are eyeing the recovering platinum price nosing above $1,000 an ounce for the first time in years. In August 2011, it was over $1,900.
<div id="attachment_5133" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-5133" class="size-medium wp-image-5133" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Peter-Leon-017-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />Peter Leon</div>
Demand for platinum, thanks to jewellery and automotive manufacturers, rose 10% in the first quarter of this year, according to the World Platinum Investment Council, while supply dropped 11%. It promises profit for South African mines if they can keep costs down; wages make up almost half of costs.
Amcu has 61% of the membership at AngloPlats, 62% at Implats and 82% at Lonmin. It holds the aces and will play a mean game for a minimum wage of R12,500 (around $860) a month. This wage has been the rallying call from Amcu ever since the bitter Marikana strike of August 2012. At the announcement of its demands in July, FORBES AFRICA questioned R12,500, saying it should be more like R20,000, taking into account four years of inflation.
“If we say R20,000 for the lowest paid, the employers are going to run away so we will go for R12,500 and work up from there,” says, the president of Amcu and part-time preacher, who appeared bullish and ready for action.
“We are applying for a pay rise here, not a strike. If the employers apply for a strike we will give it to them.”
The platinum employers are likely to be a tough nut to crack; inflation, at around 6%, is on their side. They are also struggling against years of falling commodity prices and productivity. On the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, AngloPlats shares lost two thirds of their value last year and Lonmin, kept afloat by a shareholders’ bailout in 2015, lost 99%.
Aside from the industrial problems, South Africa faces many more months of uncertainty over the country’s mining laws. Amendments to the Minerals and Petroleum Resources Development Act – which governs mining – have spent four years going back and forth through Parliament; questions have been raised over the constitutionality of the amendments. Investors take a dim view of plans to make resources – like iron and coal for the steel industry – designated minerals under the law. That would mean miners accepting government prices and maybe having to ask permission to export. This could lead to a trade law complaint at the World Trade Organization (WTO). China suffered a WTO ruling against it recently in a similar case concerning rare earth.
Then there are concerns about the discretion the law hands to the minister, giving him the power to cancel mining licences and prosecute.
“It is open to discretion, with unclear rules, which makes it very difficult to invest with that level of uncertainty and that is the long and short of it,” says Peter Leon, a mining lawyer with Herbert Smith Freehills, at a briefing in Johannesburg in June.
“We are going to a third rewrite without solving the problems of the first two.”
The bill is on its way back through the legislature and a number of bodies, including the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa. Leon and his colleagues say the chiefs came up with one of the best ideas yet – an independent body to allocate the state-owned mineral rights.
With Parliament adjourned for the August 3 municipal elections, mining experts fear it could be well into next year before South Africa’s mining code is fixed. Investors seek stability and regulatory certainty; with every passing month there is a risk more of them will turn away.

Platinum Blues

Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu—this age-old Zulu proverb explains the spirit of ubuntu; translated it reads “A person is a person through others” but many paraphrase it to “I am because we are”.
You’ll find Ubuntu in any close-knit community where neighbors help each other with anything from sharing sugar and bread to babysitting and mourning. Ubuntu in business is called philanthropy. The Latin origins of the word means the love of humankind; the desire to promote the welfare of others, mostly, through the generous donation of money to good causes.
In a historic press event in a plush Sandton hotel in Johannesburg, South Africa’s richest black man, Patrice Motsepe announced that he and his wife, Precious, would donate half of their family fortune to philanthropic causes during their lifetime and beyond.
The room was full, from clergymen and traditional leaders to South African businesses’ top brass as well as ministers and union leaders. Among them were Pamodzi CEO, Ndaba Ntsele; Jessica Motaung, daughter of Kaizer Chiefs FC owner Kaizer Motaung; chairman of Shell SA, Bonang Mohale; Zulu nation Monarch, King Goodwill Zwelithini; basic education minister, Angie Motshekga and Archbishop Tutu’s daughters to name a few.
<div id="attachment_7" style="width: 209px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-7" class="size-medium wp-image-7" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/280-261_1-199x300.jpg" alt="" width="199" height="300" />Patrice Motsepe, Johannesburg; 19 August 2011 &#8211; Photo by Brett Eloff</div>
“We want to build a track record where ordinary South Africans feel we’re making a humble contribution,” says the 8th richest African.
He assured the audience that he would make sure his children continued the tradition.
The move put the Motsepes on a list of elites who have pledged to give a majority of their wealth to philanthropy. They are the first Africans to join the Giving Pledge, founded by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett in 2010. Today, it has nearly 100 members including New York mayor, Michael Bloomberg; world-famous designer, Diane von Furstenberg; Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg and PayPal co-founder, Elon Musk.
Is this pledge a new trend in business or just an age-old tradition of ubuntu under a new light?
This is not the Motsepes’ first contribution, in 1999 they started the Motsepe Foundation, which to date has donated around R40-R50 million ($4.5-5.6 million) to business development. Last year alone they gave R20 million ($2.3 million) to major churches in South Africa. They say this move is just an acceleration of what they’ve established.
While the Motsepes have had a lucky turn of fortune, it wasn’t always that way.
“There were times when we had nothing… When I came back from America we had so many loans that we couldn’t pay our children’s school fees [and] we had to send them to good schools. But there was always belief because we come from parents who succeeded during the years when there was no black economic empowerment,” says Motsepe.
But many ask themselves whether other African entrepreneurs and companies will follow in Motsepe’s footsteps.
Philip Fauré, head of Citadel Philanthropy Advisors, says there are many wealthy entrepreneurs who are philanthropists but prefer to remain under the radar.
“Africans are more private than Americans,” says Fauré.
He also says that they avoid requests for money and security risks by doing things privately. However, he is quick to emphasize the difference between philanthropy and charity by using a fishing analogy—philanthropy is teaching one how to fish.
“Charity is never going to go away; aid is not the solution,” says Fauré.
He also says that philanthropy is a major industry worldwide, mostly in the States. He hopes that more prominent South African families will give publically.
There are a number of other African billionaires who are active philanthropists.
In 2012 alone, Johann Rupert, the third richest African and CEO of luxury goods group Richemont, gave his R3.6 million ($406,700) annual salary to charity. The Oppenheimers—the second richest family in Africa—donated R1 billion ($112.9 million) to support education in South Africa. In Nigeria, Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, gave away around $35 million and Zenith Bank founder, Jim Ovia, gave away an estimated $6.6 million. And Zimbabwe’s richest man, Strive Masiyiwa, gave away around $6.4 million.
According to wealth management company Galileo Capital, if Motsepe plans to give away half of his wealth—bearing in mind his current net worth of $2.65 billion, interest and inflation—he will give away around $40 million annually to his philanthropic missions.

Tag: Unions

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Platinum Blues

To Earn Is Human; To Give Divine